democratic -- democrat brian schatz of hawaii. senator schatz was appointed by hawaii's governor last night to fill the vacant seat of senator daniel inouye, who passed away a week ago. brian schatz got on air force one late last night. he touched down in washington early this morning. and he was a senator by this afternoon. that is a big day. so senator schatz, welcome to washington. welcome to the u.s. senate. there is a lot to catch up on. first of all, many of your new colleagues, most of the people you're about to join, they won their elections back in november. you of course did not. so it is possible that between november and now, like a normal human being, you were not paying all that much attention 20 what washington has been up to. it's the end of the year. things have slowed down. we're waiting for a new congress to come in. usually you would have time to get your bearings to figure out where the bathrooms are. that is not going to be the case this year. not with the fiscal cliff. luckily for you, we here at "the rachel